Films can portray historical narratives in ways even the best descriptive writers only dream about. Almost certainly this is why the events of the July 20 bomb plot to assassinate Hitler continue to fascinate and challenge film-makers. The bomb was planted under the table at Hitler’s headquarters by of all people, Colonel von Stauffenberg, a one-eyed war hero with half a right arm and three fingers missing from his left hand, who could almost come from the script of a Hitchcock thriller. Then, as the coup the staff officers had organised began to go horribly wrong after the bomb failed…